Pressure and Sanctions Won’t Make an Enemy Change

Dennis Ross (“On Iran, Pressure Works,” op-ed, Dec. 23) is full of hope that we're on the right track with our Iran policy, because the history of the murderous regime in Tehran “clearly” reveals that “pressure works.” He gives three examples, none of which proves his claim. First, the Iran-Iraq War ended because Khomeini “[recognized] the high costs.” An odd way of describing the surrender following the (accidental) shoot-down of an Iranian passenger plane by the U.S. Navy. The Iranians were sure it was deliberate, signaling American entry into the war on the side of Iraq.

Ditto for another of Mr. Ross's examples: Iran's sudden gestures of cooperativeness when the U.S. smashed Saddam's armed forces in 2003. In both cases, the regime, knowing it could not survive armed conflict with America, scrambled to survive. His final example claims that “the price, including sanctions,” of assassinating dissidents in Europe led the mullahs to stop. But today's far higher price has not stopped Tehran from killing Americans all over the Middle East, or from plotting assassination in Washington, D.C.

Indeed, I do not know of a single case in which “pressure, including sanctions,” has ever caused an enemy to fundamentally change its policies. Even enormous pressure leading to near-total misery has not done it. If we want Iran to stop killing Americans, or terminate its nuclear weapons program, we're going to have to work for an end to the Islamic Republic.

Michael Ledeen

Freedom Scholar

Foundation for the Defense

of Democracies

Washington